Child's Play

by Reginald Hill

  Lexie cast a horrified glance over her shoulder.

  ‘You mean it really was him? Alexander, her son, come home?’

  Now Miss Keech laughed with a mad heartiness.

  ‘You stupid girl!’ she said. ‘How could we ever, ever have thought you were clever? Oh yes, the son had come home all right. But not to her, not to that mad old woman. It was my son who’d come, Lexie, my son!’

  It was only now that Lexie began to be seriously worried for her life. A delusion as strong as this was capable of taking off in any direction.

  She said brightly, ‘So Alexander was really your son? I never knew that.’

  Miss Keech looked at her in amazement.

  ‘Is something wrong with you, girl? Are all the Hubys mad? It was Richard, my own son, lying there. He’d got into the wrong room, poor lad. Though what I’d have done with him if he’d come to me, I don’t know. You know what old Gwendoline was like about blacks. That’s why I gave him up in the first place. One of the reasons, anyway. You’ve no idea what people were like. Not being married was bad enough, but black! You’d think I’d bedded down with a gorilla or something. I couldn’t see an end to it, no money, no job. What could I do? And then I went to see her and chatted her up about Alex, and how marvellous the spoilt little brat had been, and how I was sure he were alive somewhere, and she took me on. But one sniff of my little black bastard and I’d have been out! I went to see him. I always meant one day … at least I thought perhaps one day … but he grew so surly, always on about coming home with me, or not speaking at all … it seemed best in the long run not to upset him by …’

  As her speech grew more rambling, the old Yorkshire rhythms and idiom were surfacing again. Distantly Lexie thought she heard the front doorbell ring. She took a step forward. The gun shifted as Miss Keech seemed to jerk back to awareness. Perhaps it was an accidental movement, but Lexie did not feel like finding out.

  ‘You never told him you worked here, then?’ she said.

  ‘Of course not. I didn’t dare risk it. Then I stopped going and we lost contact. All those years. All her fault! And now he’d come back and she’d shot him! No, I suppose fair’s fair. She’d had a shock. A black man in her room. She always thought their one aim was to rape white women. And calling her “mother” too! So I won’t think too badly of her, may she rot in hell! To tell the truth, I didn’t know what I felt either. It were such a shock. All I knew was, it’d be best if no one knew about him. It was so complicated, you see. If she lived, then she’d surely put me out when she found out about Richard. And if she died, God knows what they might have said about me bringing my black son here to kill her. I’d put up with her all those years. I was nearly seventy. I deserved to have some peace to look forward to at the end of my life!

  ‘So I dragged him down here into the cellar. It was just a temporary thing till I saw how the land lay. I could always say he must have stumbled down here himself and I’d not found him for a day or two.

  ‘Well, she didn’t die. She started to get better, only she thought it was all some kind of visitation. The black devil come to persuade her Alexander was dead! I nursed her well, no one can deny that. And I moved Richard’s body back there. I laid him all out decent and said a prayer and burnt a candle. I’m not a religious woman, so I don’t reckon you need church and vicar to lie peaceful. You can put me in there with him when I go, and see if I care!’

  She spoke defiantly. Lexie thought of the years of self-justification behind that defiance and tried to find some sympathy for the woman, but it was hard. She had never liked her. Now she was beginning to understand why.

  The doorbell was still ringing.

  She said, ‘What about Pontelli, the Italian? Did he come here too?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Miss Keech, bird-like alertness suddenly back in her mad, bright eyes. ‘He came. I found him skulking around. I had the gun. He said at first he wanted to see Rod and I said Rod wasn’t here. He said he knew he was here, then he started calling me Keechie and asking if I didn’t know who he was. I said no I didn’t and he said he was Alexander. I laughed and said, no he wasn’t, Alexander was long, long dead and he was a fraud and I’d make sure everybody knew it. Then he got angry and said when he came into his inheritance, the first thing he’d do was make sure I was thrown out of Troy House. He came towards me and the gun went off.’

  She looked at the weapon as if noticing it for the first time.

  ‘I didn’t mean to fire it. He turned and ran away. I laughed. I thought he’d been frightened by the noise. I didn’t know the gun had hurt him till later when I read about it. It didn’t bother me. If he’d died here, I’d have put him in the wine cellar with Richard. Two sons in the same spot. They’d have been company!’

  ‘You think he might really have been Mrs Huby’s son?’

  ‘He was someone’s son,’ said Miss Keech with that now very irritating slyness.

  The bell had stopped ringing. Whoever it was must have gone away. Lexie said briskly, ‘I think you really ought to get back to bed, Miss Keech. You’re not terribly well, you know.’

  ‘Aren’t I? Why? What’s up with me?’ she snapped suspiciously.

  ‘You’re just tired, I think. It’s all been very hard on you. And that other body being found across the field must have been the last straw.’

  She spoke with pseudo-sympathy, introducing the subject of Sharman’s death in an effort to divert the old woman’s attention from Pontelli and this staring skeleton she claimed was her son. But she realized instantly it was an even stranger path she had diverted on to as hot tears began to stream down Miss Keech’s face.

  ‘He came to the house, the man who found him, and asked to use the phone. Then the police came and I was so worried in case it had something to do with … with the other. But everyone was so polite and they just wanted to use the phone and I made them tea and everything was all right till the young man with the red hair came to the house. I heard him on the phone. I heard him say he’d recognized the dead man and it was the dark boy who’d been arrested for shoplifting and his name was Cliff Sharman. I knew at once it had to be my grandson. I didn’t know I’d got a grandson till that moment, and all at once I knew, and I knew that he was lying dead in a ditch within sight of Troy House…his father dead inside and him dead outside … I knew …’

  The thin body beneath the long cotton nightdress was racked with sobs and now at last Lexie felt that surge of true sympathy which she’d hitherto sought in vain.

  ‘Miss Keech,’ she said. ‘I’m sorry.’

  And moved forward to offer this old, cold woman who had felt the full savagery of time’s revenges the comfort of her young arms.

  Perhaps Miss Keech misinterpreted the gesture. Or perhaps she found the thought of close physical contact repugnant. She jerked backwards, trying to stand upright, and the gun went off.

  Lexie staggered backwards, shrieked and fell. The cellar was full of smoke and the ricocheting echoes of the explosion. Cutting through them came a voice crying her name. Two figures appeared at the head of the stairs. The foremost, young, slim and athletic, bounded down, not pausing by the old woman, and knelt by the fallen girl.

  ‘Oh, Lexie,’ said Rod Lomas in a tone of despair far beyond his acting abilities, ‘lie still, oh, Lexie, don’t worry, we’ll get a doctor in no time.’

  ‘Never bother with a doctor,’ said Lexie Huby sitting upright. ‘Fetch a cobbler. It’s these bloody high heels I put on so I’d look a bit taller for you!’

  The second newcomer, fat and breathless, stooped beside Miss Keech and removed the gun from her unresisting fingers.

  ‘You all right, luv?’ he asked. ‘We’ll have you back in bed in a jiffy.’

  He then continued down the steps, nodded at Lexie in passing, saying cheerfully, ‘’Evening, luv,’ and went to the door of the wine-cellar.

  ‘Richard Sharman, I presume,’ he said in a tone of some satisfaction. ‘That’s what I like, a good neat finish.’
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br />   And turning, Dalziel smiled like some benevolent Christmas spirit on the recumbent girl, the distraught young man and the slack and broken sick old woman.

  Chapter 13

  It was the day of Neville Watmough’s interview, the day of Cliff Sharman’s funeral.

  Watmough woke with that sense of divine inevitability which comes to most men but rarely, and then usually in little unimportant things. But today it was not just a matter of knowing the putt was going in the hole or the dart in the treble twenty. Today his life’s work was truly to begin, and he was ready for it.

  He woke early, not because of nervousness but because his whole body felt electric with energy. As he shaved he checked over the reasons for his confidence and found nothing wanting. He was the right man with the right record in the right place at the right time. The gods were with him. They had even made Dalziel, that normally unjust impediment, an instrument of their plan. The solving of both of CID’s current murder cases at the weekend couldn’t have fallen better. There had been a moment of doubt as to how Ike Ogilby would take the news of the arrest of one of his own reporters, but he needn’t have worried. This had been a scoop beyond an editor’s dreams, to have the killer on your own staff safe beyond reach of the inducements and insider-stories of your rivals! There had been another bad moment when Vollans had seemed set to recant his confession, claiming it had been extracted under duress, something about Sergeant Wield and a bayonet. But the café proprietor had identified him, Forensic had discovered spots of blood of the right group both in his car and on the tyres, and Vollans, after talking with his solicitor, had shifted his ground and was now angling for a manslaughter deal.

  His story was that he had picked up Cliff Sharman as arranged and gone for a drive with him. Sharman had tried to sell him various stories about police corruption and drug-trafficking in Yorkshire, but close questioning hadn’t revealed any firm evidence, so Vollans had said there was no deal. At this point Sharman, who was clearly high on something, had grown abusive. He had demanded money, Vollans had tried to eject him from the car, they had struggled.

  ‘I knocked him down, got in the car and started to drive away. But suddenly he was there again, trying to scramble on the bonnet. Next thing he slipped and was under the wheel. When I saw he was dead, I panicked and hid him in the ditch. In case it ever came out he was the one who’d been ringing the Challenger, I pretended we’d made an appointment for the following morning and he’d not turned up. It was all a pure accident, provoked by his violent and abusive behaviour.’

  The version Pascoe believed in was that Sharman had had time to cool down before he met Vollans. His unwillingness to be specific plus his colour had eventually irritated Vollans to the point where he became abusive. These nigger perverts are animals, they’ve no right to be treated like humans was a phrase in his withdrawn confession. Whether he’d deliberately run over him or not was the only point at dispute. Wield was certain he had, Pascoe tended to go along with this, but Watmough was happy to settle for Vollans’s version as this had at its centre the idea that Sharman had invented all his allegations about the police with a view to extracting money.

  In the end, the lawyers would decide all that. Meanwhile, Vollans was safely locked up, Miss Keech was safely horizontal in a hospital bed, and though the full details of that case had not yet been released to the Press, Watmough was looking forward to taking the Committee into his confidence during the forthcoming interview. Purely by chance he had found himself the previous night sitting next to the Committee’s Chairman, Councillor Mottram, at the dinner to inaugurate Eden Thackeray’s Presidency of the Gents. He had not missed the chance to prime Mottram so that he could ask the right questions this morning. Yes, fate was certainly shaking the golden fruit into his lap at the moment. Mottram had told him that they’d just had word of the withdrawal of Stan Dodd from Durham, adjudged by the makers of books and by Watmough himself, to be his arch rival. A heart attack. Poor Dodd. He must remember to send him a get well card.

  All he had to do now was wait. The Committee was meeting at County Hall. Interviews of the four surviving candidates would take place at hourly intervals from nine o’clock. At one, the Committee would debate its reactions over lunch. And as soon as may be thereafter they would announce their choice. Watmough’s interview was the final one, at midday, the prime position. The gods had even given him the best initial.

  With such complacent thoughts he drove slowly to Police Headquarters which he now viewed fondly as his own. Entering, he returned the greetings of those he encountered with a friendly (but not too friendly) wave, imagining their surprise to see him turning up for work on this most important of days, and their admiration, even envy, of his sang froid and sense of duty.

  But his attendance was not simply a gesture. He wanted to be right up to date with all aspects of the Force’s work when he turned up at County Hall, particularly of course with the fine detail of the two murder cases.

  And there at the centre of his desk was a large buff envelope with his name printed on it in a hand which was unmistakably Dalziel’s.

  Why did the name Belshazzar suddenly flit into his mind?

  He opened the envelope and withdrew its contents slowly.

  First was an internal memo. He began to read it.

  TO: DCC

  FROM: Head of CID

  SUBJECT: Sexual deviancy in Mid-Yorkshire CID.

  He paused here to brush his fingers across his eyes as though to remove an impediment to his vision. Then he read on.

  As per your instructions (copy of relevant memorandum attached) I have consulted with Dr Pottle of the Central Hospital Psychiatric Unit concerning possible m.o. for detecting sexual deviancy in CID officers. Enclosed is draft questionnaire for your approval.

  He let the memorandum flutter from his fingers and turned to the questionnaire. It consisted of four sheets of A4 size, alternating blue and pink in colour.

  The first was headed CONFIDENTIAL, addressed to ALL CID PERSONNEL and gave as its issuing authority DCC.

  There was a blurb.

  This is a multi-choice questionnaire aimed at rounding out file information for use in assessing promotion, location and designation of personnel.

  Tick only one box in each section.

  He let his eyes move trance-like on the pages, focusing on questions at random.

  (3) As a baby were you

  (a) bottle fed?

  (b) breast-suckled?

  (c) don’t know?

  (9) Were you ever interfered with by a relative?

  (a) yes

  (b) no

  (15) Did you ever masturbate

  (a) alone?

  (b) in company?

  (c) both?

  (29) Which do you prefer next to the skin

  (a) silk?

  (b) cotton?

  (c) leather?

  (d) blue serge?

  He read no further but sat for a while gazing at his Yorkshire Beauty Spots Wall Calendar. Today’s date was ringed in red. This month’s picture was a view of Fylingdales Moor with the Early Warning System prominent.

  There was something else on the memorandum. His censorial eye had skipped it first time round, but his ill-divining soul had taken it in.

  DISTRIBUTION: CC

  ACC (1)

  ACC (2)

  Chairman and members of Police Committee

  (as per DCC’s directive CK/NW/743 on Consultation and Information)

  With an effort of will which might well have won him the job if the Committee could have seen it, he carefully replaced the questionnaire in its envelope and locked it in his desk. He found in himself a very great need for a drink and the bottle of thin sherry he kept for hospitality purposes had little appeal.

  There was only one place he could get a proper drink at this time of day in safe and soothing surroundings. He left the station with the same measured tread as he had entered it, only this time he acknowledged no greeting. It was not a long walk. Ten
minutes later he was entering the door of the Gents.

  ‘’Morning, George,’ he said to the steward in the vestibule. ‘I’ll have a large Scotch, in the smoking-room.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Quiet day for crime, is it?’ said the friendly steward.

  Not quite understanding the remark, Watmough went through into the smoking-room, a haven of peace and repose, empty at this hour except for a single figure behind an outspread copy of The Times.

  Even under stress, Watmough did not ignore the courtesies expected between gentlemen members.

  ‘Good morning,’ he said.

  Slowly the paper was lowered.

  ‘’Morning, Neville,’ said Andy Dalziel, beaming. ‘Now isn’t it grand to have a place like this to escape to when things get rough down at the factory?’

  Only two mourners attended Cliff Sharman’s funeral, his grandmother, Miriam Hornsby, and Wield. It was a busy afternoon at the municipal cemetery - autumn was a good dying season as though ailing souls balked at the prospect of another winter - and a long back-up of cortèges blackened the curving driveway to the little chapel. The officiating vicar consigned the coffin to the grave as speedily as possible and spoke his parting condolences over his shoulder.

  The silent mourners hardly noticed his departure. Here there were no residual resentments to be heaped on the coffin like handfuls of earth; here would come no dramatic interruptor to mar the time’s solemnity; here was only grief and the futile self-reproach of those who did not know how they might have done other.

  ‘Nineteen years,’ said Mrs Hornsby. ‘It’s not much.’